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Governor Chet Culver said it best himself, on April 27th of this year:
"Global warming is a real danger that threatens our very way of life, and it is our responsibility to take any and all steps that we can to reduce our greenhouse gas emissions and hope to curb global warming."Well, we have a suggestion for the Governor. He should immediately impose a statewide moratorium on the building of new coal-fired power plants, and instead direct state funding and subsidies to developing Iowa's enormous potential for clean and renewable wind energy.
At the present time, a New Jersey company has proposed building a 750-megawatt coal-fired power plant just east of Waterloo; a 600-megawatt plant has also been proposed for Marshalltown. These plants will pour out carbon dioxide equal to almost two million cars on Iowa's roads -- for the next 40 to 50 years. They will also pollute eastern Iowa's rivers and lakes with hundreds of pounds of mercury annually, making fish caught from these waters unsafe to eat.
The governor has the opportunity to put a hold on the permitting process until the Iowa legislature can act on the Climate Change Advisory Council's recommendations for greenhouse gas reductions in Iowa. Drop him a note today and ask him to show leadership on this issue.
If you feel strongly on this issue, send Gov. Culver an email here.
I go back and forth on the proposed coal plant in Marshalltown. I can see the economical benefits, but have a lot of questions when it comes to the environmental impact and health concerns.
4 comments:
Actually, Mid American is building a massive wind-generation farm in central Iowa right now.
Not sure, though, exactly what hand Culver had in this, if any.
Upon further research; $250 million wind farm in Carroll. Read on...
http://www.iowaindependent.com/showDiary.do?diaryId=201
Part of the deal with Alliant is that they will add a certain amount of wind turbines in the state. I think this makes sense to be done without building the coal-fired power plants.
Call me a madcap but I strangely agree with NoNeed on this one.
It makes no sense to build coal plants in Iowa-we no longer have coal in Iowa. The coal will have to be shipped to Iowa-this consumes large amounts of energy before any is produced. Although the new plants are far cleaner than old coal plants, that response begs the ultimate question-why use coal at all in Iowa?
There are places in America with a lot of coal and few really windy locations. Maybe coal would be better there but we don't need it here where the western 1/3 of the state is one big windy prarie and the east has a large number of rapid flowing rivers (Cedar, Iowa) that could generate hydro power. I'd also bet the the hydro power on the DSM river could be dramatically enhanced.
We not only need to encourage the large utilities to invest in truly renewable technologies (which I think should/could include nukes for places like Iowa-not the first resort but available) but also provide economic incentives to more decetralize energy production (e.g. little wind mills, solar roofs, corn burning furnaces, etc...)so everyone can get into the energy independence game.
These aren't silly alternatives and the market would drive them like hot cakes without much help and the government could do much to encourage the ecomonic comptetiveness of these alternatives.
We also cannot become a mess like California, utility companies have to make a lot of money with the making is good-'cause that market is very unstable-but we have a right to expect them to provide a longer term energy strategy.
....... and if cutting carbon does impact global warming then there's a net benefit that can bring the libs on board.
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